Brand Missions And Avoiding Confusion | Blog | Corke Wallis

Do you get confused by brand missions and visions, purposes, propositions, etc? I do. 

To avoid confusion, I use a JFK story and one of his speeches. You’ve heard the story: JFK is talking to a janitor at Nasa in the 60s. JFK asks the janitor what he does at Nasa and the janitor replies ‘I’m putting a man on the Moon’.

Whether it happened or not, it’s the perfect example of how a mission unites and motivates an organisation.

For purpose, values and personality I look at how JFK supercharged the space race with his ‘We choose to go to the Moon' speech to Rice University in 1962. (You can see it at The Moonwalkers in Kings Cross, London, it’s the best bit.) From the speech, the Mission states: “We choose to go to the Moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win, and the others, too.” 

Ok, I’m in.

The Purpose is clearly articulated as: “The growth of our science and education will be enriched by new knowledge of our universe and environment, by new techniques of learning and mapping and observation, by new tools and computers for industry, medicine, the home as well as the school. Technical institutions, such as Rice, will reap the harvest of these gains.”

I see the value in the mission. Brand diagrams are necessary for organising messages and explaining a hierarchy, but they are no substitute for some electrifying prose. Great brand communication isn’t about complexity or jargon - it's about clarity and inspiration. The janitor knew exactly how he fitted into the bigger picture, just as everyone in an organisation should. It's that simple, powerful clarity we should strive for in branding.